Sing along and vote responsibly

Indie band, Agnee, spreads the message of responsible voting with their new track, Pair Anaadi as part of an upcoming Hindi film

Keeping up with the electoral mood, Indian music band, Agnee recently released a track, Pair Anaadi. The track, part of the film, Yeh Hai Bakrapur (YHB), a political satire releasing soon, hopes to inspire people to vote responsibly.

Agnee’s lead vocalist, K Mohan, performing live

The song, says K Mohan, the band’s lead vocalist, is a take-off from the popular Hindi saying, ‘apne pair pe kulhadi marna’ (axe your own foot/ asking for trouble), and expresses how as a nation, we bring the wrong people to power either by voting for the wrong person, or not voting at all.

“We as a nation seem to define the term ‘we deserve the people we elect to govern us’. We are also the loudest when it comes to complaining about the people we elected. We’re like the proverbial foot looking for an axe...in fact, a bit too eager to inflict punishment upon ourselves,” he claims.

Sing, and make sense
The song, which Agnee will perform live at blueFROG today, urges people to self reflect and vote responsibly but without being preachy about it. And that, says Mohan, was the biggest challenge. “None of us in the team (whether the film or the music) likes to be preachy or even try. We need to make sure that we vote responsibly and then make sure the people we vote to power do their job the way we expect of them as leaders,” he believes.

The song was a last-minute idea, and never planned as part of the film. “The film is a political satire and the situation in the country right now is also pretty much screaming for a political satire. So, we thought, why not do a song around that,” explains Mohan. The band already had a tune; all Mohan needed to do was pen the lyrics. It was then Abbas Tyrewala stepped in with the phrase, Pair Anaadi Dhoonde Kulhadi, and thus the song was born. The song was to be sung by Mohan, but the line-up was changed when Raghu Ram of Roadies fame, and Indian Ocean’s Amit Kilam and Rahul Ram came on board.

Passion vs money
Keeping up with Agnee’s tradition of releasing music for free on the Internet, the song Pair Anaadi is a free download; a decision that was fixed from the time everyone came on board for the film. Mohan adds that almost everyone who’ve been part of the music of this film has worked on a pro-bono basis (except for token payments), either because they loved the film and wanted to do something with it, or because they were happy working with friends.

“Given that the music was created in this fashion, the one step we would have taken (and almost did take) of monetising the music would have been the first step to commercialise this project. It was natural to say we shouldn’t. We all love money, but we all also know that being in the field of music, some happiness (like that of a million people listening to your songs or a few thousand singing them back to you) just cannot be bought,” he voices.

Soon, Agnee intend to release two more songs, each with a call to action. “The other two songs will have a humanitarian theme, such as helping educate children, attached to it. We’re not going to impose any rules (for example, do this else you will not be able to hear the song or see the video). We’re just saying that if you like the song, and if you want to, please do this,” he suggests.

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